These eggs are not for your omelete...

While we've been working on cleaning up the landscape around the house these past couple of weeks, we spied a little something hiding in one of the bushes right next to the front door.

We've been checking them every couple of days to see if there had been any development, but when I was out trimming yesterday, I heard some faint noises coming from said bush. I carefully pulled one of the limbs back and peaked in to see that our little friends had burst from their azure enclosures and were quite hungry! What a majestic event as they arrived on Mother's Day of all days. Spring is certainly full of little surprises around here!

We go through quite a bit of chicken and are always looking for new ways to enhance it with new flavors. We added a little heat and crunch to a few chicken breasts with tonight's dinner of Spicy Pecan-Crusted Chicken. Coating the chicken is a ground mixture of pecans, panko breadcrumbs, orange zest, salt and chipotle pepper - using a combination of nuts and breadcrumbs added substance and texture with a light citrus scent from the bright orange zest. For this recipe, the chicken is pounded fairly thin which allows for a very quick cook and it gives more area for the nutty coating to adhere. Juicy with a golden brown shell, the ground chipotle added a hint of spice and a mild smoky background - we both thought this would be a nice way to prepare chicken breasts to slice and add to a fresh and crisp green salad. That will be our lunch tomorrow though, as tonight we eagerly finished up the leftover Northwest Waldorf Salad from last night!

Recipes
Spicy Pecan-Crusted Chicken